After the boys signed the letter of intent they were informed that the soul-opening ceremony would be that afternoon when Ithil thought his apprentice would be back. Until then he suggested they grab lunch and enjoy their free time, he had hinted not so subtly that they might not get any more for a while. The boys decided to grab a quick lunch and then afterward look through the guild shop and pick out some starting gear. Ithil had thought that was a fine plan but had warned the boys to keep their adventuring goals in mind when picking gear and to ask him if they had any questions before making their final decisions.

Since they had signed their letter of intent and paid their first fee Ithil had encouraged them to use the cafe across the street because the cafe provided 20% off the meals of adventures. Jokingly he informed them that he thought “The tuna melt is really good if you like tuna but the noodle dishes were simply meh” Smiling the boys agreed that sounded great.

In just a few moments Seth found himself sitting across from Jason at a patio table waiting for his burger. Jason looked up from his menu after having ordered and started “You know I just realized you never told me how you plan on throwing those fireballs”

Seth looked confused “What do you mean?”

Jason frowned and spoke with exasperation “What do you mean what do I mean? There are lots of ways to throw fireballs Divine, Elemental, and Infernal all of them have fireballs. Didn't you ever talk about this with your old man?”

Seth thought about it for a moment. He remembered talking with his Dad about his limited adventuring but had never really talked to him about the details or the day-to-day of it. “I guess not really?” Seth's voice raised towards the end of the statement realizing that it seemed odd that they had never really talked about it. Seth met the boy's gaze and spoke “I never really asked. How do you seem to know about all this stuff?”

Jason smiled “My grandfather was a Paladin, first for the adventures guild and then later Holy church. He moved out of a big city to Farmer's rest when my dad was a little younger than me. Said he wanted to retire to some place where the world moved a little more slowly. We talk about it all the time his stories are so cool”

Seth now interested continued his questions “And how about you Mr. Big shot what do you want to do? Must have it figured out if you know all this already”

Jason beamed with confidence “I want to swing a sword like my grandpa.” Seth laughed, of course, he did. Jason had always been the more physical of the two. He enjoyed playing ball with the other boys in school so did Seth but Jason had been better at it. He was outspoken too and had always policed the school yard watching out for the younger kids and looking out for bullies.

“Well then at least your choice is easy, anyone can swing a sword,” Seth said dismissively.

Jason's smile dropped for a moment as he became more serious. “Not really,” Jason started “It's not as easy as you think. There are dozens of different types of swords and probably hundreds of different ways to swing them, plus if you don't take the right supporting skills you'll never be particularly strong or may just fall over dead the first time you make a mistake.”

Seth thought about it for a moment and realized that Jason might just know what he was talking about. “So then what are you going to pick?.”

“Well as I said” Jason stopped to thank the waitress as she dropped off their food, Seth accepted his burger gratefully, and he grinned when he noticed that Jason had ordered the tuna melt. “It's not as simple as you might think. Grandpa recommended I start with a classic 'the sword and board' as he called it or a sword and shield. I think I'm going to go with a tower shield or something like it if I can get it and something easy to swing. As for a starter link grandpa gave me this” he reached into a small satchel that he had been carrying and pulled out a dusty old book. The book was old but looked as if it were well cared for. The leather binding was dark and had been oiled regularly. It had bronze-looking strips on its spine but Seth couldn't be sure if the metal was actually bronze or not.

“What's that?” Seth said entranced by the book, “And what's a link?'

“A link,” Jason began “Is an item that contains memories and ideas that you can connect to that help you learn and master various concepts” Seth knew a little about links that people followed and prayed to that represented certain ideas. His father for example often burned incense to Idios and used one of that church's links. Idios was a spirit his Das believed God had sent to earth to teach men the ways of math and science. He didn't know if Idios was real but his father certainly thought so and sometimes even claimed that's why he had, had such success working for the alchemist he assisted.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

Seth took a bite of his burger and noted that it was delicious and that given the chance he would want to eat there again. “So,” He said after he had swallowed and his mouth was empty again. “If I wanted to say link to EOS the angel of fire I could?” He asked questioningly. “Jason nodded taking a bite out of his sandwich. Seth noticed he was chowing down on his Tuna melt and it was already half gone.

“You could,” Jason said “But Eos has a very limited domain it could give you really powerful Fire spells and abilities but probably not much else. Though If I remember right Eos is a warrior archangel so she could probably provide some combat abilities as well, you would have to ask the Guild master to check his records. It's probably a pretty common choice so he may have some decent records of abilities that can come from choosing that particular figure. Do you really want to focus on just fireballs?”

Seth thought about it for a moment “No, not just fire, fireballs, lightning, wind I want it all.”

Jason paused to think for a moment as he finished the last bits of his sandwich and started in on the fries “The way I understand it the more generalized something is the weaker the skills are in general that's not always true but since you would have to level each skill individually it could take a long time to acquire significant power. Grandpa told me it's better to choose a few core abilities even if they're split among multiple links and focus on those.”

Seth seemed surprised by the idea you could have multiple links and proceeded to ask about it “You can have multiple links?”

At this point, Jason seemed irritated by Seth's lack of apparent knowledge on the subject. Still, Seth was a friend, maybe his best friend so he tried to remain calm and understanding. “You can” Jason stated “Though links are really expensive and don't take offense I don't think you'll be able to afford even one just starting let alone multiple” Jason waved for the waitress and asked for the check he motioned to Seth indicating he would pay for both meals.

“Thanks, I'll get the next one” Seth stated.

“Don't worry about it you'll have lots of chances to pick up the meals in the next couple of years as long as we stay in a party” A party Seth knew was the basic unit of an adventuring group and consisted of four to five people. His Dad had explained that was normally the size they stayed because it was enough people to create a well-rounded group but not so many that it made the logistics of traveling together too difficult. His Dad had said that most groups stayed together for months or years sometimes even lasting entire adventuring careers. He knew that his Dad still occasionally wrote a man he had partied with in a town a couple of hundred miles away and had always enjoyed getting a letter from the man. The man's name was Lance and according to his Dad he was death incarnate with a breaker sword a big two-handed sword his Dad said looked more like the wing of a small plane than a conventional sword.

After Jason had paid the bill the boys got up and started walking across the street back toward the guild house. On the other side of the wide path, Seth stopped and looked at Jason leaning up against the ramshackle guild hall. “So what do you think I should pick?” Seth said consternation evident in his body language.

Jason just looked at him “I couldn't possibly tell you that.”

Seth seemed confused by the response but stood there silently for a few minutes before responding “Why not?”

Now it was Jason's turn to pause in thought. “I just can't. Your skills define you. I'm sure Ithil will tell you this but what skills you have will speak volumes about what kind of person you are some skills directly affect the person who uses them.”

Seth looked at him questioningly “How?”

Jason continued hardly pausing “For example, if a guy forges a bond with a chaos entity and enjoys flinging fireballs he's probably not going to be the calmest individual. It's well known that some bonds can drive their users insane if they're not careful and some skills are nearly as bad for the person using them as the person they're being used against.”

Seth continued to think as he spoke “I'll need to be careful when I chose my adventuring to build there's a lot more to it than I thought.”

Jason's familiar smirk blossomed on his lips as he spoke “There is a lot more to a lot of things than you think” he laughed, “Come on let's get inside it's almost three and I want to look through their gear before the ceremony”